DUSEL planning on track

A graphic summarizing the various kinds of scientific experiments that could take place in the proposed Deep Underground Science and Engineering Laboratory.

At the first meeting of potential DUSEL users, participants and funding agencies expressed satisfaction with the progress of the design for the next proposed national laboratory and its experiments.

"Where the proposal is today is very satisfactory, and the trajectory is good," said Joseph Dehmer, director of the physics division at NSF.

If approved, construction and experiment installation could begin in 2014 and continue for seven years. A few experiments still in the R&D phase would be installed one to three years later.

The breadth of the experiments and their often one-of-a-kind nature makes DUSEL stand out, attendees said. Not only will the physics experiments put the U.S. at the head of neutrino and dark matter research, but the depth and large caverns the experiments require will allow for deep underground biology, geology and engineering research at unprecedented scales.

The suite of experiments will not be finalized for at least another year. The DUSEL Program Advisory Committee said a loosely-defined suite of experiments is specific enough to finish the facility's design but leaves flexibility for later selecting individual experiments and their designs.

So far NSF has received 25 research proposals. In general, the non-physics programs will study carbon sequestering, tunnel engineering, deep life forms and the effects of water removal and construction on seismic activity and life forms.

The proposed physics experiments break into five broad research categories: supernovae, dark matter, proton decay, neutrino mass hierarchy and neutrinoless double beta decay.

Current construction plans would allow for two simultaneous installations at the surface level. Vertical experiments such as carbon sequestering would exist from the zero to 1,700-foot level. The 4,850-foot level cavern could hold four to five physics experiments while the 7,400-foot level cavern could accommodate two physics experiments. All levels also could contain earth science experiments.

In December the preliminary design report with a revised schedule and cost will be given to NSF. DOE and NSF will receive an updated report on DUSEL science in spring 2011, and the funding agencies are expected to decide in August 2011 whether to proceed.

"We are looking forward to the next steps on this," said Heidi Schellman, DUSEL PAC member. "So, let's go."

-- Tona Kunz

University of Chicago's Paul Sereno gives croc talk today

Naperville native and University of Chicago professor Paul Sereno will give a lecture tonight titled "A Croc Odyssey: Speedy Gallopers with a Taste for Dinosaurs."

Follow the expeditions that uncovered a menagerie of extinct crocodiles with Paul Sereno, who will deliver the Fermilab Lecture on Friday, Sept. 10. In his talk he will explain how these extinct African castaways and their living descendants unravel the evolutionary story.

The Naperville native and Northern Illinois University graduate earned a doctorate at Columbia University and the American Museum of Natural History and has taught paleontology and evolution at the University of Chicago since 1987.

"In paleontology, I saw an irresistible combination of travel, adventure, art, biology and geology," Sereno said.

His travels have led him from the foothills of the Andes to the heart of the Sahara desert, where his team unearthed 100 tons of dinosaur fossils and a diversity of new species. His latest discovery, a stunning human burial site dating back 10,000 years, ranks as one of the most spectacular prehistoric burials ever discovered.

Sereno is the author of books and stories in National Geographic and Natural History and has been the subject of scores of documentaries. He has won numerous awards for teaching, mentorship, and outstanding contributions to paleontology. He will give a lecture, "A Croc Odyssey: Speedy Gallopers with a Taste for Dinosaurs," is at 8 p.m. in the auditorium. Admission is $7.

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High-energy physics: Higgs or bust? Fermilab weighs adding three years to Tevatron run

From Science, Sept. 9, 2010

Scientists at the last remaining U.S. particle physics lab have a shot at a major discovery. But pursuing that prize means delaying other projects that could enhance the lab's long-term viability. Should they still go for the glory?

That's the question facing Pier Oddone, director of Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory (Fermilab) in Batavia, Illinois. Last week, an independent advisory committee urged him to run the lab's 25-year-old atom smasher, the Tevatron collider, for an additional 3 years through 2014. The extension would give Fermilab researchers a chance to beat their European rivals in spotting the most prized particle in physics, the Higgs boson. That chance, the panel concluded, is worth potential disruption in the schedules of other projects. Unfortunately for Oddone, however, it could also cause problems for the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), which funds the lab, and jeopardize the lab's future.

The Higgs boson is the lynchpin to physicists' explanation of how all particles get their mass. And Fermilab researchers have a chance to see it first because the more-powerful Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at the European particle physics laboratory, CERN, near Geneva, Switzerland, is running years behind schedule. In February, CERN announced that the collider will shut down for extensive repairs for at least 15 months beginning in 2012. At that point, the LHC won't have produced enough data to surpass the Tevatron in the race for the Higgs.

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